CBS News, Showtime To Launch ’60 Minutes of Sports’ Newsmagazine

CBS News and sister pay cable network Showtime are partnering on a new sports newsmagazine, “60 Minutes of Sports.” The program will air on Showtime, greatly bolstering the pay cabler’s sports news output.

The program will debut in November, with new editions airing monthly. Each episode will feature two new, original segments, one updated classic “60 Minutes” segment as well as a timely in-studio newsmaker interview. Correspondents from both “60 Minutes” and CBS Sports will participate in the program.

“This is an exciting opportunity for all of us at 60 Minutes,” said CBS News chairman and “60 Minutes” EP Jeff Fager, who will also EP the new program. “Our Showtime edition will offer the same high-quality, original reporting and great storytelling our viewers have come to expect every Sunday night on CBS.”

While Showtime has extensive sports programming, it has lacked a sports newmsazgine to call its own. HBO has been the longtime home of “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel,” which routinely receives accolades for its strong reporting, while ESPN has “E:60.”

More information, below.

CBS NEWS AND SHOWTIME SPORTS® TEAM UP FOR

“60 MINUTES OF SPORTS”

Original “60 MINUTES” Content to Air on SHOWTIME®

In a Unique Expansion of the Iconic Brand

Monthly Sports News Magazine from the People who Bring You

“60 MINUTES” Debuts in November on SHOWTIME

NEW YORK (Sept. 13) – For the first time, original 60 MINUTES segments will appear on a cable network under a new agreement between 60 MINUTES and SHOWTIME Sports. 60 MINUTES OF SPORTS, a new sports news magazine show from the producers of the iconic news program, will debut in November on SHOWTIME, the CBS-owned premium television network. The unique programming partnership was announced today by CBS News Chairman and 60 MINUTES Executive Producer Jeff Fager and Stephen Espinoza, the Executive Vice President and General Manager, SHOWTIME Sports.

“This is an exciting opportunity for all of us at 60 MINUTES,” said Fager. “Our SHOWTIME edition will offer the same high-quality, original reporting and great storytelling our viewers have come to expect every Sunday night on CBS.”

“Today is a seminal moment in the 25-year history of SHOWTIME Sports,” said Espinoza. “60 MINUTES is the pioneer of this genre. Adding the most well-known and highly respected brand in television to the growing line up of SHOWTIME original sports programming exponentially increases the value proposition for our subscribers. This is an incredible opportunity for the CBS and SHOWTIME family.”

60 MINUTES OF SPORTS expands SHOWTIME Sports’ existing line-up of award-winning original sports programming, which includes INSIDE THE NFL, INSIDE NASCAR, ALL ACCESS, THE FRANCHISE and live event series SHOWTIME CHAMPIONSHIP BOXING®, STRIKEFORCE Mixed Martial Arts and ShoBox: The New Generation.

60 MINUTES OF SPORTS will be co-executive produced by Fager and Bill Owens, the Executive Editor of 60 MINUTES.

The new program will utilize the reporting skills of on-air talent from 60 MINUTES and CBS Sports, while providing the same first class 60 MINUTES investigations, interviews, features and profiles that have kept the broadcast in Nielsen’s Top 10 for decades. A dedicated unit of 60 MINUTES producers reporting to Fager and Owens will prepare the stories for each monthly broadcast of 60 MINUTES OF SPORTS.

Each month, the sports magazine will feature two original segments and one updated 60 MINUTES classic sports story from the news magazine’s archive. In addition, each broadcast will contain a timely, studio-based interview with a sports newsmaker.

About 60 MINUTES

60 MINUTES, the most successful primetime broadcast in television history, begins its 45th season on September 30, 2012. The news magazine begun in 1968 is still a hit in 2012. Over the 2011-’12 season, 60 MINUTES continued its dominance as the number-one news program, drawing an average of over 13 million viewers per week, more than double the audience of its nearest newsmagazine competitor. It has won more Emmy Awards than any other primetime broadcast, including a special Lifetime Achievement Emmy. It has also won virtually every other broadcast journalism award and is the recipient of 18 Peabody awards for excellence in television broadcasting. 60 MINUTES was created by Don Hewitt; Jeff Fager is the program’s executive producer. The correspondents and contributors of 60 MINUTES are Steve Kroft, Lara Logan, Scott Pelley, Byron Pitts, Charlie Rose, Morley Safer, Bob Simon and Lesley Stahl, plus CNN’S Anderson Cooper and Dr. Sanjay Gupta. 60 MINUTES television segments and other content can be viewed online at 60MINUTES.com and 60MinutesOvertime.com, which offers archival segments and original content produced for the Web, including behind-the-scenes video about the production of 60 MINUTES stories.

About Showtime Networks Inc.

Showtime Networks Inc. (SNI), a wholly owned subsidiary of CBS Corporation, owns and operates the premium television networks SHOWTIME®, THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ and FLIX®, as well as the multiplex channels SHOWTIME 2™, SHOWTIME® SHOWCASE, SHOWTIME EXTREME®, SHOWTIME BEYOND®, SHOWTIME NEXT®, SHOWTIME WOMEN®, SHOWTIME FAMILY ZONE® and THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ XTRA. SNI also offers SHOWTIME HD®, THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ HD, SHOWTIME ON DEMAND® and THE MOVIE CHANNEL™ ON DEMAND. SNI also manages Smithsonian Networks, a joint venture between SNI and the Smithsonian Institution. All SNI feeds provide enhanced sound using Dolby Digital 5.1. SNI markets and distributes sports and entertainment events for exhibition to subscribers on a pay-per-view basis through SHOWTIME PPV®.

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